If you are interested in working with us Summer 2027, don’t hesitate to get in touch! We frequently take on summer students.
Pascal Lavoie
MD, PhD, Co-Principal Investigator
Pascal is a physician at the BC Children’s & Women’s Health Centre and researcher at the BC Children’s Hospital Research Institute. His research is focused on understanding immunity to infections in populations from newborns to adults.
Fun fact: I like water sports. At a younger age, I used to do windsurfing, scuba diving (my father is a professional scuba diver), played water polo, swam competitively, and even played underwater hockey for over 15 years. Now, I am more "quiet" — enjoying occasional catamaran sailing for fun with my children once in a while off Jericho Beach.
Allison Watts
PhD, Project Manager
Allison received her PhD in Epidemiology from UBC. Her research interests include understanding nutrition behaviors and determinants of health behavior change from adolescence to adulthood.
Fun fact: I enjoy trail running or cross-country skiing on the North Shore mountains and discovering good coffee shops to refuel afterwards.
Abdelilah Majdoubi
PhD, Research Associate
Abdel received his PhD in Immunology from Université de Montréal, and has since done a postdoc at Yale University researching genetic and environmental factors that shape neuro-inflammation and modelling immune tolerance in the central nervous system.
He also performed a postdoc in Dr Lavoie’s lab where he studied how cross-reactive immunity affects COVID-19 clinical outcomes after SARS-CoV-2 vaccination.
Blandine Dang
PhD
Blandine is currently doing her PhD, specializing in neonatal and viral immunology, with a focus on understanding how early-life immune development shapes susceptibility to RSV.
Amirhossein Golzan
PhD
Amir is currently doing his PhD, specializing in how early-life microbiome development shapes infant immune responses to RSV (gut-lung axis). He did his masters at UBC investigating the effects of luminal sterol compounds on C. difficile pathogenicity.
Claudia Makhanko-Tang
MSc
Claudia is currently doing their masters program, with special interest in understanding the pathogenicity of sepsis, with the aim to improve diagnostic methodologies using genetic sequencing.
Caitlin O’Malley
MRes, Research Assistant
Caitlin has completed her master’s degree focusing on host-pathogen interactions, with a particular interest in human immunology. She is now a research assistant for the Lavoie Lab where she works closely with participants throughout the study and is always happy to answer questions or discuss participation at any stage.